For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been giving tips on how to increase your blog traffic; today, I’m going to attempt to put one of those tips to use. I am opening up my blog to guest bloggers.

If you love to write blog posts and just can’t seem to find enough places to add your content—this is for you!

I am looking for blog posts that will help my readers—primarily work from home entrepreneurs—to grow their businesses. My blog is geared mainly to those involved with the company MCA (Motor Club of America); however, I also have readers who are running other work from home businesses.

Please take a look at my blog, and the type of content that I regularly produce, to see if you feel your expertise would work on my blog. All blog posts will need to be approved before appearing on this blog. I will include your name, a short byline, your blog link and two social media links.

I will be adding a “Guest Blogger” tab within the next few days. If you are interested now, please leave a comment and we can discuss the type of content you have to offer.

I am also available to guest blog if you feel that my knowledge would fit your readership.

Blog commenting not only allows you to give feedback to a blogger, but can also help you increase your own blog traffic.“Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net”.

Last week I offered up my first two boost your blog traffic tips: The Ultimate Blog Challenge and Guest Blogging. Today I want to talk to you about blog commenting.

One of the things that sets a blog apart from a website is the ability to post comments and engage visitor interaction. Blog visitors can let a blogger know how they felt about their post. They may agree with the post. They may disagree. They may even have something unique and valuable to add to the conversation. But how will blog commenting (you commenting on other blogs) help you bring in more traffic to your blog?

As a blogger you want to continually create more ways for blog readers to find your blog. One of the ways you can do this is by commenting on other blogs. Every time you leave a comment, and you fill out the comment form, you are leaving a way for blog readers to find you. They can click on the highlighted link and make their way to your blog—keeping them there is up to you and your blog content.

If the blogs you are commenting on have certain plug-ins installed—such as CommentLuv or Livefyre—a link to your last blog post will show up below your comment. This allows viewers to see the title of your last post and follow the link directly to it. I use CommentLuv on this blog. I love it!

Blog commenting can also help you procure guest posting spots. As a blogger, I often follow links to posts of bloggers who have left comments on my site. I have found several blogs I know follow just from those comments. If a fellow blogger likes what they see (from your comment and your own blog posts) they may feel inclined to ask you to guest post on their blog.

I hope you have found this boost your blog traffic tip on blog commenting helpful! Please check out the first two boost your blog traffic tips listed below:

Three tips to generate more leads for your business.“Image courtesy of David Castillo Dominici / FreeDigitalPhotos.net”.

If you are an online marketer, odds are you are constantly trying to find new ways to generate more leads for your business. Gathering leads can be tricky; however, it is your job to find people who are interested in purchasing your product or service. But how do you effectively generate quality leads for your business using your blog? Check out these 3 tips to help you with lead generation.

Write More Content

Whether you are trying to bring more traffic to your blog, raise your search engine ranking or generate more leads, writing useful content is one of the most important things you can do. Let me point out that just any content won’t work—you need to ensure that your content is top quality. Your content needs to be useful to your readers, not just give them fluff to read. Providing useful, keyword rich content—and lots of it—will provide entryways (urls) to your blog. The more entryways you have floating around the web, the easier your blog is to find. If you are writing just one post per week, you probably aren’t pulling in a lot of leads. If you don’t think this tip works, try increasing your blog posts to one post per day for several weeks (during the Ultimate Blog Challenge is a great time to try this out). Track your results. The more visitors you have to your blog, the more likely hood of reaching those who are interested in your product or service.

Make Sharing Your Content Easy

If you are looking to generate more leads for your business, you will want to make it super easy for blog viewers to share your posts. Add social media sharing tools to your blog. This allows readers to Tweet your posts on Twitter or share your posts on Facebook with ease. The easier it is to share your content, the more often people will take the time to share what you have written. While they may not be interested in what you have to offer, someone on their social media sites may be very interested.

Comment On Other Blogs

If you are looking to generate more leads for your business, you need to consider commenting on more blogs. When you leave a comment on someone’s blog, you generate a link back to your blog by filling out the comment form on the blogger’s website. If they utilize “CommentLuv”, you will also leave a link to your last post. If you are comment on popular, good-quality, blogs it can definitely help you to gain readers and generate more leads for your business. Try commenting on three to five relevant blogs per day for about a month and see what this practice can do for your blog.

There are several other ways to generate more leads for your business, but these three tips can definitely put you on your way to increasing your leads.

What lead generating tips do you have to offer? How do you generate leads?

Looking to increase your blog traffic, gain more followers and increase your sales? If so, you will want to follow along with my boost your blog traffic tip series. Over the next few posts, I will be offering valuable information to help you increase the amount of traffic to your blog, which can also help increase the amount of products or services you sale—depending on the business of your blog.

For today’s boost your blog traffic tip, I want to introduce you to a online quarterly event that can help you increase your blog traffic. It is the Ultimate Blog Challenge, hosted by Michelle Shaeffer and Michele Scism. This event challenges the participants to post one blog post per day for a month. Now you may be asking why you should take this challenge and how it well help boost your blog traffic. I’m glad you asked. Let’s explore.

1. Keeps you disciplined.

Anyone who runs a blog—personal or business—knows that it can be difficult to stay disciplined where writing blog posts is concerned. When you begin your blog, you are excited and ready to post almost every day. Then the excitement turns to monotony. You start focusing on other parts of your business and you forget to post regularly. Or, it just doesn’t seem important. If you want to continue to bring visitors to your blog, you must write blog posts. The Ultimate Blog Challenge will help you build that discipline; you may not continue to post every day after the challenge, but you will better understand the importance of frequent blog posts. Frequent blog posts bring more traffic to your blog.

2. Builds your blog readership.

When you join the Ultimate Blog Challenge, you agree to read and share posts from other bloggers. At the same time, other bloggers are reading and sharing your blog posts. This helps to build up a following. Whether you gain a follower from the list of bloggers, or someone they share your post with, someone along the way will enjoy what you have written. Then that person will share your post—and so on, and so on. You need blog readers, you want blog readers. Working together the Ultimate Blog Challenge bloggers help to build a larger blog readership for each other.

3. Builds connections.

There is just something about connecting with other bloggers that I find…ummmm….helpful. Most of the people who read my blog are individuals interested in signing up with Motor Club of America or Motor Club of America associates who need help with building their business. I need these people to read my blog. It grows my business and increases my income. However, I also feel I need other bloggers to read my blog as well. Bloggers see your blog differently than potential customers. They have an understanding regarding how this whole thing works and how it needs to work in order to grow your business. Even the best blogger in the world can benefit from feedback from others with the same goals—to increase our readership and grow our businesses. We need the interaction that can come about from taking the Ultimate Blog Challenge.

4. Creates a habit.

Humans are creatures of habit—which also includes bloggers! If we participate in an activity long enough, it seeps into our brains and develops into something that simply becomes natural. If you are determined to blog long-term, you need your blogging ritual to become a habit. Participating in the challenge, even if you only post 20 out of the 31 days, creates that type of habit. You want to get into a routine with your blog. A routine where writing a blog post is as common as checking your email. Once you have built that habit, posting to your blog won’t seem like a chore—it will simply be an activity that you complete in order to grow your blog and your business.

It isn’t too late to join the Ultimate Blog Challenge. Just click on the link provided and follow the instructions. I am sure that you will find this first boost your blog traffic tip beneficial.

As always, if you are interested in learning more about Motor Club of America, leave a comment or send an email to info@MCAworkfromhome.com.

Let me begin by asking a question; do you have a business blog? If you answered no to this question, let me guess why you aren’t utilizing a blog for your business.

Did I get it right? Are these some of the reasons you haven’t decided to start a business for your blog? I have heard many other excuses as to why people don’t want to start a blog for their business and I normally leave the conversation shaking my head. While it is true that blogging can be time consuming, if you want to increase sales, find more customers and grow your business—you need a blog. I am going to give you 3 of the top reasons you should blogging. Ready? Read on.

A blog gives you authority.

When consumers look for a product or service they want or need, they look to an authoritative figure—be it a business or a person—to help them make their purchasing choice. They want to know that the business they are purchasing from is credible and trustworthy. This is where having a blog for your business comes in. If you are posting interesting, and relevant, content regarding your product or service you’re knowledge on the subject matter. As consumers read your posts, they come to understand you know what you are talking about and you become the go-to blog when they want to find information about the product or service you offer. You now have authority. You are the guy, or gal, with the information. This type of scenario also happens with word-of-mouth; however, individuals can’t run back to you every time they want to go over what you originally told them. If you have a blog set up for your business, they can revisit anytime they want.

A blog helps customers find you.

You may think that having a website is all you need to gain traffic—and your ½ way correct. When you build a website each page on that site receives a unique URL that will be broadcast (hopefully) across the search engines, allowing potential customers to find you. If you have a 10 page website, that means there are 10 different gateways by which you can be found. Now, let’s say you don’t have a static website (check this link for the differences in blogs and websites), but you have a blog that you regularly update. And let us say that you post 72 blog posts over the next 6 months—which means you updated around 3 times a week. Now you have 72 additional gateways by which customers can find your business. Like web pages, blog posts receive their own unique URLs that potential customers may stumble upon through the search engines. Ensure that you are providing relevant, useful content and your readers will keep coming back for more.

A blog makes you approachable.

When you are attempting to attract customers, you don’t want to seem like just another impersonal company. You want your customers to relate to your products and services. You want them to feel like your company is accessible and that it cares about its customers. A blog can help you do just that. Your blog posts allow you to show off your company’s personality, as well as offer quality information to your customers. Because individuals can leave a comment on your blog posts (if you don’t have comments enabled on your blog, change that like yesterday) they can ask questions and give you feedback on the services and products they have already used.

I could continue this blog and offer tons more information about why you need a blog for your business—there are so many advantages. If you have any questions or would like to know more reason on why you need a blog for your business, please feel free to comment below or send an email to info@MCAworkfromhome.com.

I get a lot of questions about how I’ve used a blog to market my business. In answering these questions I have found that many people are confused about the differences in a blog Vs. website. If you are one of these people, don’t feel bad; I too was not completely educated about the differences when I began my work from home journey.

Let’s just start by pointing out that blogs and websites are completely different creatures. They can, and do, have similarities, but contain different elements and have very different purposes. To know which creature you need, blog Vs. website, you must first understand how each differs from the other so you can decide which one is best for you and your business.

Content

When you frequent a blog, you will notice that the content changes—if it is updated properly. The content (or blog posts) will change depending on the blog writer’s content schedule. They may update their blog once per day, twice per week, twice per month—but the content will update and change. If you visit entrepreneur Michelle Shaeffer’s blog, the first page you see will contain a summary of her latest posts. Click on the title of any of the posts from that day and you can read the entire post. Blogs showcase content in reverse chronological order, meaning that the freshest content will be at the top of the blog summary page—with older posts being being underneath based on the post date.

At the bottom of each post you will also find a place where you can comment on her content. You can share your opinion, ask questions or simply thank her for the information. Comments make a blog interactive. They give the reader the opportunity to share their views on the content and can allow the blog owner the opportunity to expand their thoughts and begin a real conversation on the subject.

When you visit the main page of a website you will see static information. I’m going to use the Jenny Craig website as an example; only because it is that time of year when everyone thinks about getting healthy and geared up for Summer. The website shows off information about the Jenny Craig program. When you click on the tabs at the top of the page you are taken to pages of “static” information that tell you all about the program and offer tips and hints for your weight loss journey. While the content will most likely be revamped over time, it doesn’t include content that is updated on a regular basis. I do want to point out that this website does host links to weight loss blogs, although it isn’t an actual blog.

Unlike a blog, there is also not a place to leave a comment regarding the information on each page. This website is here to show information about the program and to sell products and services. It is an online advertisement. And other than the forum that this particular website offers its viewers, the communication only goes one way—from the website owner to the website viewer.

Overall Feel

Websites normally have a more professional feel. The content is often written more formally. Blogs, however, are often written in a less formal way. The goal of a blog is to put out informative/educational information about a topic. The topics may vary depending on what is going on in the blogger’s life or what topic the blogger wishes to educate her readers about. While websites can also offer educational/informative content, it is normally geared toward the service or product the website is showcasing.

Conclusion

Simply put, think of a website as an online storefront—where you go to purchase a service or product—and think of a blog as an online magazine—where you go to read regularly updated information about a topic or somehow related topics—example: a parenting site that talks about topics related to babies and children.

I hope this has helped clear up some of the differences between blog Vs. website. If you still have questions, please leave a comment or contact me at info@mcaworkfromhome.com.

August of this year was a banner month for me. A lot of people have been following my success and asking questions about my August 2013 income. I want to point out that this was an exceptional month and while it will most likely fluctuate, my goal is to raise my income even higher over the next six months by adding more multiple streams of income.

While MCA is my biggest income earner, it is not my only stream of income at this time—and is not the only contributing factor to my August 2013 income. I also participate in a referral program for GWP (Get Weekly Paychecks), GWP is my capture page used to capture the attention and information of individuals interested in the program I am offering—in this case MCA. GWP pays me for every referral I send to them that actually signs up to use the GWP capture page.

I also have my website monetized with Google Adsense. Adsense supplies the ads featured on my website. If an individual sees an ad they are interested in on my website, I receive a few cents—depending on the particular ad. As I said earlier, I am working on some other streams of income to help me raise my monthly income amount. If you put all of your eggs in one basket, you won’t have much if those eggs get broken. My August 2013 income has grown because I choose to have income coming in from multiple areas.

Below is a list of My August 2013 income and the sources.

MCA (Motor Club of America) $ 9,323.08

GWP 240.00

Google Adsense 850.03

Total August 2013 income $10,413.11

As you can see August was a very good month. Please check out the video below that talks more about my multiple streams of income and how I’ve earned this money with my blog.

If you would like more information, leave a comment or drop me an email at info@MCAWorkFromHome.com

Contuining to Blog when you have a low amount of viewers will eventually pay off! Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Many people are under the assumption that a blog is only worth something if you have a large amount of viewers—I say those people are wrong. Let’s be honest; we would all love to have a million viewers a month who adore our writing and praise us on the Internet. The cold hard fact is that most of us do not have anywhere close to this many viewers. So does this mean that we should just give up blogging and find another way to spend our days? Absolutely not—let me tell you why.

It takes time to build up blog viewers. This “if you build it, they will come” strategy doesn’t always work when you are talking about blogs. It will take time to build up a following and to gain unique views through search engine searches. The main thing is to not give up on your quest. Enjoy blogging and sharing information with the world, and eventually you may just hit those 1 million views. Below are three reasons blogging is worth it even if your viewer count is low.

1. Reaping the benefits of search engines. If you are ever going to gain an abundance of viewers, you need to improve your rank in the search engines. While we want to write our content for our viewers and not for the search engines, we must realize that ranking well will bring us more viewers. Provide relevant, fresh content on your website—keyword optimized, of course—and you will reap the benefits that come from ranking well in search engines—even if it sometimes takes a little while.

2. Stand out from the competition. If you are continually updating your blog with useful information, you will get noticed. Whether you are selling a product, providing a service or simply sharing information, you want to stand out from the hordes of blogs that offer the same thing you do. Continuing to provide your current readers with valuable insights and information will help produce word of mouth advertising, which may come in the form of your readers sharing your blog posts online.

3. Create a never-ending advertisement for your product or service. As long as your blog is up and running—and unless you remove the post—your content speaks as a continuous advertisement for what you are offering the online world. Other forms of advertising eventually end—newspaper ads, TV spots or magazine advertisements. While views of a specific blog post may drop off as you add more content and the blog ages, viewers may end up finding your post in the search engines two years from now. Don’t think of your blog posts as a short term investment. Realize that you may gain viewers months or years down the line simply because they stumble upon a post you wrote ages ago.

If you continue to add quality content to your blog, you viewership will grow. Just remember, even the most popular bloggers had to start somewhere.